I guess Gysahl is probably one of the bigger servers, because I've never really noticed a huge lack of players at any given time, but I played Wednesday and tonight and I must say, the population feels like it's climbed up a bit. I'm guessing people are back checking out the update, which makes me optimistic about this trend continuing in the future mini updates. If people come back and like what they see, I bet a good number of them will stick around.

How are other servers looking in the wake of the first patch? Any old faces popping into your linkshells, or are you finding more people waiting for behest to start? I'm just wondering how many other servers are experiencing the mini-boom found on mine.

ive noticed 60+ people showing up at some behests on beseid now so yeah, definately a jump of people back on

Yeah, the number of people showing up for behest is increasing on Gysahl too... makes me wonder if behest will even be doable when the PS3 crowd comes. Will camping the behest NPC be the new NM camping?

i was still doing levequests at nanawa mines and nophicas wells up untill today. yesterday and a little bit ago those two areas were pretty deserted, but i arrived at broken water cuz i just hit 33 (thanks to the new SP ^^) and this area seems to be busy compared to the other two.

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Yeah, the number of people showing up for behest is increasing on Gysahl too... makes me wonder if behest will even be doable when the PS3 crowd comes. Will camping the behest NPC be the new NM camping?

I havent poked my head out from crafting since the update until just now and I can say that on Lindblum the JP population is way up right now, I will have to wait til US times to see if the US population is up.But if the JP population is any indication its gonna be up a lot.

Ul'dah is hopping like crazy. Tons of people at camps of all levels. Nanawa mines behest gets full within 25 seconds whenever i'm on, and the main city is buzzing with crafters everywhere. Gridania is pretty deserted though...I think the trend on Mysidia is that even if you are apart of a different nation, all the action is in Ul'dah, so everyone in congregating there.

Ul'dah is hopping like crazy. Tons of people at camps of all levels. Nanawa mines behest gets full within 25 seconds whenever i'm on, and the main city is buzzing with crafters everywhere. Gridania is pretty deserted though...I think the trend on Mysidia is that even if you are apart of a different nation, all the action is in Ul'dah, so everyone in congregating there.

Agreed, my hometown is Gridania, been back maybe twice in the past month. All the action is in Uldah or around. Seems to have become the Jeuno of FFXIV atm. Don't know how the other servers relate.

When it comes to sitting around not doing anything for long periods of time, only being active for short windows, and marginal changes and sidegrades I'd say FFXI players were the perfect choice for politicians.

I'm seriously concerned about Behest. I haven't even seen the behests at camps above rank 20, but at Camp Horizon on Gysahl, you have about 1 second to get into the event before you're locked out... there's just so many people.

As the population continues to climb, it will be interesting to see what SE does to keep this from being an event that causes more frustration than fun.

Well Gysahl was declared the 'Oceanic' server right from the start and it has a very large amount of Japanese and Australians playing on it. R40 camps in the evening are just jam packed full of leve 'tourbuses'. Personally I find Uldah/Thanalan to be much more busy than LL or Grid

I have noticed a bit of an increase on Besaid. Camps in Gridania and some spots in La Noscea are usually pretty deserted still, but the ones in Thanalan seem extra packed. I understand everyone flocking to one region when the server population is so small, since it makes for easier grouping (and behest is much better with a decent sized group IMHO). But given how crowded Broken Water behest is while Nine Ivies ad Bald Knoll are relatively deserted, I hope that as the population increases it will also distribute itself at least somewhat more evenly. ^^

Ive noticed a TON of people lately, too..especially during behests...always only have about 2 seconds to get it before its full xD at least 30 people waiting most of the time, especially at camp horizon.. Its wonderful!

But given how crowded Broken Water behest is while Nine Ivies ad Bald Knoll are relatively deserted, I hope that as the population increases it will also distribute itself at least somewhat more evenly. ^^

It is not because of the population that BW is packed.

BW is close to Halatali, very close, and they are both r40 Camps. BW has Necrologos, Dunesfolk and Cracked Eggs which give very very good SP when linked and maxed stars. BW have Quartz Doblyn and Sphene Doblyn camps.

I have noticed the population in general has gone up on Besaid at least. Lot's more people around the camps and such. This is a good sign.

Yep, quite a lot of people (more than what it was in the beginning of December when I went on my break) on Besaid. AND what I have noticed also is that Besaid actually has quite a big European population <3 <3

But given how crowded Broken Water behest is while Nine Ivies ad Bald Knoll are relatively deserted, I hope that as the population increases it will also distribute itself at least somewhat more evenly. ^^

It is not because of the population that BW is packed.

BW is close to Halatali, very close, and they are both r40 Camps. BW has Necrologos, Dunesfolk and Cracked Eggs which give very very good SP when linked and maxed stars. BW have Quartz Doblyn and Sphene Doblyn camps.

Those are reasons why BW are always packed.

This.

I don't take Ul'dah area Behests being full as a sign that people are returning. 15 players is a really, really small amount considering this is supposed to be a major MMO. I think the reason for them being competitive is obvious - they give a lot of SP now. If 600 people are online, it's pretty reasonable to think 20 or 25 will be at Horizon, Nanawa, or Broken Water given how good the SP is.

I'm not seeing anything that would make me think the population has gone up much. I still run into the same players often - too often in my opinion.. I'd like the population to be going up, but I don't think that has a chance to happen until significant content is added or the PS3 players get to play.

Edit - To give an exact example, at the moment I see 8 players in the immediate vicinity of the repair NPC in Ul'dah. This is how it's been for a long time.. But I do remember when the area was comparatively packed like sardines, the month or two after release.

I don't take Ul'dah area Behests being full as a sign that people are returning. 15 players is a really, really small amount considering this is supposed to be a major MMO. I think the reason for them being competitive is obvious - they give a lot of SP now. If 600 people are online, it's pretty reasonable to think 20 or 25 will be at Horizon, Nanawa, or Broken Water given how good the SP is.

I'm not seeing anything that would make me think the population has gone up much. I still run into the same players often - too often in my opinion.. I'd like the population to be going up, but I don't think that has a chance to happen until significant content is added or the PS3 players get to play.

Edit - To give an exact example, at the moment I see 8 players in the immediate vicinity of the repair NPC in Ul'dah. This is how it's been for a long time.. But I do remember when the area was comparatively packed like sardines, the month or two after release.

Edited, Feb 8th 2011 7:57am by Coyohma

I don't measure this with just the people I see... I measure this with items and retainers that can be found in all Market Wards. You can find almost anything from there now and the wards are full of retainers to browse through. Also, this could be because I just joined a busy LS, but I seem to find people online in my linkshell at any given time. Maybe Besaid is busier server but there is always 20+ people near the repair NPC and I don't think I am far off to say that there are always 50+ people standing around the main stairs in Uldah as well.

I don't measure this with just the people I see... I measure this with items and retainers that can be found in all Market Wards. You can find almost anything from there now and the wards are full of retainers to browse through. Also, this could be because I just joined a busy LS, but I seem to find people online in my linkshell at any given time. Maybe Besaid is busier server but there is always 20+ people near the repair NPC and I don't think I am far off to say that there are always 50+ people standing around the main stairs in Uldah as well.

The Wards were just updated to help with that.. I think measures like Friend List or LS are too small a sample size for me, but for what it's worth one LS I have is always active too. Then again it's huge and contains a good chunk of the active server...

Once upon a time, SE released FFXIV. The game was so bad that they had to suspend subscription fees indefinitely because of a mass player exodus and no guarantee that those currently playing would stay if they were charged. We will know that server populations are increasing when SE announces they will be charging a monthly subscription fee, which will stop the financial bleeding they're experiencing from production and server maintenance costs. Otherwise, there is no way to firmly determine if populations are increasing. 10 people at a behest site does not a full server make.

I don't measure this with just the people I see... I measure this with items and retainers that can be found in all Market Wards. You can find almost anything from there now and the wards are full of retainers to browse through. Also, this could be because I just joined a busy LS, but I seem to find people online in my linkshell at any given time. Maybe Besaid is busier server but there is always 20+ people near the repair NPC and I don't think I am far off to say that there are always 50+ people standing around the main stairs in Uldah as well.

The Wards were just updated to help with that.. I think measures like Friend List or LS are too small a sample size for me, but for what it's worth one LS I have is always active too. Then again it's huge and contains a good chunk of the active server...

Eh, it's really tough to get a gauge on how the population is doing based on what you see around you. Yesterday alone Ul'dah was packed, then I went to Nophica's Well for Behest, packed, go back 1 hour later, completely empty. Ported to Gridania, I didn't see a single other player going to the Archer guild and shop to buy more arrows. I wish this was something they could fix, making Ul'dah the central hub of 3 towns just didn't work well. I get that people converge to one area in most games, but it shouldn't of been one of the 3 starter cities.

I'm seriously concerned about Behest. I haven't even seen the behests at camps above rank 20, but at Camp Horizon on Gysahl, you have about 1 second to get into the event before you're locked out... there's just so many people.

As the population continues to climb, it will be interesting to see what SE does to keep this from being an event that causes more frustration than fun.

Yes and Yes. I was thinking the same thing. I predict a Behest-every-30-minutes limited time (holiday) event.

But given how crowded Broken Water behest is while Nine Ivies ad Bald Knoll are relatively deserted, I hope that as the population increases it will also distribute itself at least somewhat more evenly. ^^

It is not because of the population that BW is packed.

BW is close to Halatali, very close, and they are both r40 Camps. BW has Necrologos, Dunesfolk and Cracked Eggs which give very very good SP when linked and maxed stars. BW have Quartz Doblyn and Sphene Doblyn camps.

Those are reasons why BW are always packed.

Oh, yes, those are excellent reasons! I am sorry for not being more clear, you are right. I had meant to convey that those camps in Ul'dah were usually the crowded ones anyway but that I had noticed a slight increase in population in those areas while the empty areas seemed just as empty. Naturally I'd expect Broken Water to remain one of the more popular spots for the reasons you mentioned. But I find having some areas be super crowded and others deserted to be rather frustrating and was just hoping that when some areas get too packed people will try expanding their horizons (erm, pun totally not intended) and visiting other camps more often. :)

Ah well, I suppose some "growing pains" may happen as the game improves and more people log on. ^^

I'm seriously concerned about Behest. I haven't even seen the behests at camps above rank 20, but at Camp Horizon on Gysahl, you have about 1 second to get into the event before you're locked out... there's just so many people.

As the population continues to climb, it will be interesting to see what SE does to keep this from being an event that causes more frustration than fun.

Yes and Yes. I was thinking the same thing. I predict a Behest-every-30-minutes limited time (holiday) event.

At any rate, it's a huge change of pace to see people so avid about playing FFXIV.

Behest at tranquil is never full (at least on rab). If people really hate having to spawn camp the battlewarden they should just move to gridania. Last time I did R20 behest there I was with 3 other people only.

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lolgaxe wrote:

When it comes to sitting around not doing anything for long periods of time, only being active for short windows, and marginal changes and sidegrades I'd say FFXI players were the perfect choice for politicians.

I'm seriously concerned about Behest. I haven't even seen the behests at camps above rank 20, but at Camp Horizon on Gysahl, you have about 1 second to get into the event before you're locked out... there's just so many people.

As the population continues to climb, it will be interesting to see what SE does to keep this from being an event that causes more frustration than fun.

Putting some sort of level restriction on the behests would go a long way towards alleviating, or at the very least easing, this problem. Perhaps my experience isn't a common one, but it seems like nobody moves on to the higher level camps to do behest there. The rank 20 behests are awash with people in the low to mid 30s, taking spots from people who legitimately belong in this behest. Perhaps if they institute a "You must be between 18 and 28 to do behest at Camp Horizon" type cap, it would push people to move on to the higher camps. This would greatly relieve some of the pressure on the lower level behests.

Well only time will really tell where the population is going, whether it be up or down, but i expect that the PS3 launch will add a significant chunk, and that as news spreads that the game is being fixed up under new management and rapidly so, the population should also see an influx of one time subscribers returning to try out the game again. Now if they would implement a 14 day free trial and upgrade package that could go a very long way to getting new people, especially those who would like to try it but dont want to invest $20-60 (depending on where you go) into that curiosity.

I personally see a lot of people on Gysahl, but then again i picked it because it was one of the "higher density" servers - I don't like ghost towns :P

Putting some sort of level restriction on the behests would go a long way towards alleviating, or at the very least easing, this problem. Perhaps my experience isn't a common one, but it seems like nobody moves on to the higher level camps to do behest there. The rank 20 behests are awash with people in the low to mid 30s, taking spots from people who legitimately belong in this behest. Perhaps if they institute a "You must be between 18 and 28 to do behest at Camp Horizon" type cap, it would push people to move on to the higher camps. This would greatly relieve some of the pressure on the lower level behests.

Yeah, same goes for the other camps... problem I had trying to rank up THM was at 28 I was getting half the SP on a cedarwood behest as at a bloodshore. I would have been happy to do cedarwood but so many people over R40 that I would get like 50 SP per mob compared to 80-100 per mob at bloodshore (this was pre-patch btw)

So I understand why R20 behest is spammed with higher rank peeps - because EVEN HIGHER people are at the R30 camps.

TBH people who are R15 etc should be at the R10 camps too- but you see R15 and R16 people at R20 behest all the time.

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lolgaxe wrote:

When it comes to sitting around not doing anything for long periods of time, only being active for short windows, and marginal changes and sidegrades I'd say FFXI players were the perfect choice for politicians.

I'm seriously concerned about Behest. I haven't even seen the behests at camps above rank 20, but at Camp Horizon on Gysahl, you have about 1 second to get into the event before you're locked out... there's just so many people.

As the population continues to climb, it will be interesting to see what SE does to keep this from being an event that causes more frustration than fun.

On Besaid I logged on at like, 3:04 pm a couple days ago to check out the patch. Saw 3 people run off with the NPC moments later to do Behest. Wasn't until reading this that I'm honestly curious how you can have that many people wanting to do Behest.